"Don't put your happiness in other people's hands.
               They'll drop it.
  They'll drop it every time."

-C. Barzak

we’re merely strangers
disguised as a family.
four cornerstones
propping up the dinner table --
a doll house
when seen through a telescope, though
the peachy porcelain pillars are tarnished by
the cracks at their corners.
“perfect family” shines in neon lettering on the threshold.
it looms over us, frantically peppering the conversation
long gone stale.
it stings my eyes,
and burns my tongue
to speak.
my teeth are plastic,
my fingers plasticine,
pieced together carelessly
a millennia ago,
when warmth still existed in the spaces between us.
now, we are cloaked in our own despondencies,
eyes staring not at each other,
but through.
we float past each other
as ghosts;
though I’m the only one
who hears the echoes.

It's kind of sad when you have friends who you say are your family,
and say your family is not.

It's depressing when your family does not accept you as a member,
and you never thought of yourself as one.

It's a little unsettling when you can picture your future being beautiful and bright, without seeing them ever again.

In my family mental illness isn’t a question of
“Will I or won’t I?”
It’s a question of
“When and how badly?’
Because in my family mental illness isn’t a question
It’s a promise
It’s a promise that you hope someone will break
And you realize that life after 20 isn’t a guarantee
Because it’s a question of
“Will I bury my parents or will my parents bury me?”
Because if the mental illness doesn’t **** you
It’ll be the cancer
Or the diabetes
Or maybe the heart disease
But in my family making it to 80 is something
Only two people have seen
And you learn to stop asking questions
And in my family
You learn to laugh while you can
And to smile in the rain
To drink while it’s legal
And to die at inconvenient times
Like before weddings
And graduations
And birthdays
And you learn to stop asking whose coming
And stop sending out invitations
And just hope someone is alive to see you
Dying

**** me over,
put me in agony,
but it is okay,
because we are all family.
Accept defeat,
take the hit,
when you are with family,
you deal with this ****.
But what if you could pick and choose,
who you keep and who you lose,
well then those would be friends,
who you can pick until your heart's content,
but remember that isn't family,
that is merely people for rent.

I want to be the one
in their history books
the legend around the campfire,
a name they won't forget.

My heart longs for greatness,
my bones rattle at the thought
of changing this decrepit rock
into something beautiful again.

Wherever I turn my eyes,
people are breaking on the inside,
homes are burning from this pain;
I see creation crying for freedom.

Can I change anything?
This question keeps me awake,
weeping in the latest hours,
begging God to let me fight.

I hear their cries!
I see emptiness in their eyes,
lost children walking the streets,
asking "Why did he leave?"

How is it I love those I've never seen?
My soul aches for their suffering,
there are human beings dying
and nobody is doing anything!

When they asked me what
I wanted to be when I grew up,
It was always a hero,
someone who fought for others.

All my life I've cared too much,
I'm beginning to feel claustrophobic,
I was given this big heart,
then placed in a little world.

I fear I am simply crazy,
a senseless romanticist.
But I curse my insecurities,
they will not **** me!

My dreams are impossible,
they say it's just my youth,
I'll grow out of this heart,
and join the rest of society.

But I violently refuse!
Let me be a light in a dark room,
may I bring hope to all who breathe,
I give my life to change eternity!

*~ Matthew Walker ~